18th-Century Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 36

[cahn]

Starting a couple of comments earlier than usual to mention there are a couple of new salon fics! These probably both need canon knowledge.

felis ficlets on siblings!

Siblings (541 words) by felisnocturna
Chapters: 2/2
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great, Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf, August Wilhelm von Preußen | Augustus William of Prussia (1722-1758), Wilhelmine von Preußen | Wilhelmine of Prussia (1709-1758)
Summary:

Three Fills for the 2022 Three Sentence Ficathon.

Chapter One: Protective Action / Babysitting at Rheinsberg (Frederick/Fredersdorf, William+Henry+Ferdinand)
Chapter Two: Here Be Lions (Wilhelmine)

Unsent Letters fic by me:

Letters for a Dead King (1981 words) by raspberryhunter
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great & Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen (1726-1802)
Characters: Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen | Henry of Prussia (1726-1802)
Additional Tags: Epistolary, Love/Hate, Talking To Dead People, Canonical Character Death, Dysfunctional Family
Summary:

Just because one's king and brother is dead doesn't mean one has to stop writing to him.

Comments

Saxon diplomacy: Wannabe Diplomatic Revolutionaries

[mildred_of_midgard]

So after Fritz has consolidated his hold on Silesia, Brühl recognizes that there's only one way to get it.

1746-1747: Brühl starts making some headway in his efforts to broker a peace between Austria and France. Now, brokering a peace between two major powers is a thing that makes a middleweight power like Saxony move up the totem pole. If two major powers take you seriously like that, it makes you look good and gives you political advantages. This is why Fritz is always offering to broker peaces too.

But! In a foreshadowing of things to come, the peace talks shift to a congress in which Saxony just gets to play a middleman role and not a leadership role. Sorry, Saxony!

1748: Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle aka Aachen, ending the War of the Austrian Succession.

1749: Since France and Austria are no longer at war, MT asks her ministers for their take on the foreign policy scene, and Kaunitz produces his memo on "Why we should ally with France."

In 1752, Fritz gets a Saxon secretary in his pay, who copies every document that goes through his office and sends it to Fritz. MT and Kaunitz start to realize that all Saxon secrets are immediately known to Fritz.

In 1756, MT and Kaunitz therefore make the effort to keep all their negotiations with France super secret from Saxony. Which is why that whole thing plays out without any involvement of Brühl, even though everyone knew he wanted this more than anything.

Watching Brühl speculate about what's going on in late 1755/early 1756, as the Diplomatic Revolution is negotiated, and as MT and Britain maneuver to get Russia in their corner, is so much like watching Fritz's opinions unfold that I have to wonder just how much of Fritz's opinions were garnered straight from those Saxon write-ups he got.

So what happens there is even after word starts to get out about the Diplomatic Revolution, there's a lot of "Oh, it'll never last" and "How much have they promised each other, anyway? Probably not much" and "Nothing to see here."

Then when people start to realize this alliance is serious business, and Austria and France ask Saxony if it wants to join, Brühl hesitates.

Brühl: Hmm. Let's consider the options here. Russia is firmly in GB's pocket. GB is subsidizing Russia, and Russia wants those British-funded troops to invade East Prussia.

Brühl: And of course Britain is at war with France.

Brühl: So Russia's never going to join an Austro-French alliance that will put them at odds with their British paymasters.

Brühl: So if we join Austria-France, we'll end up at war with Russia and GB.

Brühl: And Russia lives right next door to Poland, and they want a weak Poland, and the last thing they want is us getting a land bridge and consolidating our territories and making Poland a hereditary monarchy and all powerful and threatening to them and stuff. And they're really not big on France having influence in Poland.

Brühl: And Russia has LOTS and LOTS of troops and lives right next door, and the British have LOTS and LOTS of money, and we have neither.

Brühl: Conclusion: we can't afford to piss off Russia!

Brühl: We also have this neighbor to the north who's very invasion-happy. We can't afford to piss off Prussia until we're sure Russia won't take their side.

Brühl: Conclusion: Saxony can't afford to join this alliance until Russia is on board.

So instead of leaping on the bandwagon, Brühl starts negotiating for "If Fritz invades Saxony, you'll defend us, right? Send lots of troops? Big armies with your best generals?" with Austria and France.

MT and Kaunitz: ...Look, we'd love to have you, but we don't need you that much.

Brühl: But what if we--

Fritz: Too late, Saxony, I already invaded! You snooze, you lose.

Now Saxony is diplomatically isolated as a result of all its caution, and under ruthless enemy occupation. It's screwed. The Diplomatic Revolution that Brühl had tried to pull off was implemented without any reference to Saxony in the end, and the Saxons missed their chance to even join it.

Footnote
Incidentally, Jürgen Luh reviewed one of the books I read, René Hanke's Brühl und das Renversement des alliances, and then got into an argument with the author that went like this:

Hanke's book: Brühl was the real diplomatic innovator in Europe! He doesn't get enough credit.

Luh's review: Okay, but that's because he didn't pull it off. Brühl can talk all he wants about who should ally with whom, but Kaunitz is the real innovator here.

Hanke's reply to Luh's review: Luh seems to think that I said Brühl was responsible for the Diplomatic Revolution. I didn't! We all know that was Kaunitz. But Brühl thought of it first!

Luh's reply to Hanke's reply: Somehow, what I said got misconstrued as accusing Hanke of saying Brühl masterminded the Diplomatic Revolution. I never said that. What I said is that it doesn't matter who thought of it first (and the idea had been proposed before Brühl anyway). What matters is who makes the alliance happen, and that's NOT your guy!